Quest for Onepus - Part 3

Previously… Larson was alone on his ship when Tawni hailed him with an SOS. Her cruiser being damaged, he let her stay on his ship until he was able to drop her off…

We ate together, because what else was there to do? She offered to make me something. When I declined, she made a joke about me being afraid that she might poison my food.

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” I said, seeing if she would take the bait.

At first, she just looked at me. I couldn’t help it – I smiled. She rolled her eyes and muttered “liar” under her breath. Then she, too, smiled.

“Listen, Tawni, I was wondering if you would like my help fixing your cruiser? That way it may get done quicker,” I offered.

“Trying to get rid of me, eh?” she laughed.

“I didn’t mean it that way. It’s just that it will take me a while to get anywhere without my HD.”

“Well, what’s the problem? Maybe I can help.”

I hesitated a moment, before admitting the truth. “It’s a little embarrassing… But I ran out of fuel and I use a very specific type that I can only get from –”

“Onepus,” she filled in. It wasn’t a question. She knew Onepus. I could tell.

“Yes. You’ve been there?” I asked her.

“Uh, yeah. I was actually on my way there,” she smiled faintly.

“Well, it’s not too far. You’ll get there just fine once your cruiser’s fixed.

“What about you?” she asked sympathetically. “Won’t it take you like a long time?”

“Maybe an extra week or two. I’ve done worse.”

After we ate, we went our separate ways. I went to the bridge to contemplate life and the universe and she went to her quarters to… do who knows what? It seemed like neither of us really wanted to spend more time with the other than necessary. Why was she heading to Onepus? She didn’t seem like the type who fit in with the sophisticated crowd on that high-class planet. Neither did I, but I was a paying customer. Was she? Why did I even care? I didn’t. It didn’t matter to me where she was going or where she came from. Tawni would go back into the faceless masses once she left. I doubted I would see her again once I finally got to Onepus. She probably wouldn’t even still be there by then. That was good enough for me.

6550115

Tawni out

Tawni and I had been living and working together mostly in silence for about five days. Well, I mostly in silence. She liked to talk a lot. I felt maybe she was one of those people who needed to fill the silence. Surprisingly, I didn’t really mind too much.

Sometimes she would tell me childhood stories about her brothers. Five of them, she said. She really seemed to love them. I wondered why she wasn’t with them.

Sometimes Tawni would ask me hard questions. Like making a choice between saving a shipfull of infants or an entirely populated planet. And if I said something like, “It’s ridiculous to have a shipfull of infants by themselves,” she would say, “That’s not the point. You’re just supposed to choose and say why.”

One day, she really got me though. She asked if I believed in God. To be honest, I hadn’t thought about Him in a long time. So I just shrugged. Which was, apparently, the wrong answer.

“How can you not believe in God?” she exclaimed. “Look at everything. Look at this ship!”

“I worked very hard for this ship,” I informed her.

“And everything outside of it? How hard did you work for that?” she asked pointedly.

Well, she had me there. I wouldn’t deny the existence of a God, I just didn’t want to get too close to Him. Not knowing quite what to tell her, I said, “God does His thing, I do mine.”

She wasn’t satisfied with that answer, I knew it. I knew that I’d never hear the end of it until she was gone. But she did let it drop then, for which I was grateful. The question still bothered me though. Was she going to try to convert me or something?

Tawni certainly was a character. I even almost started to enjoy her company a bit. Until one day I heard her – talking with someone else. On my ship! Why was there someone else on my ship? I walked as quickly as I could toward the voices. They were in the beaming room. She had obviously beamed some stranger onboard – without my permission, of course.

When I got into the room, there was a man with Tawni. He looked at me with complete innocence, seemingly unaware that I was on the precipice of kicking Tawni out into space. Tawni at least had the decency to look guilty.

“Captain Larson,” she hesitated. “This is Able Ryson. He uh…” I let her stumble over her words a bit before cutting in.

“Would you excuse us a moment?” I said to the man.

As soon as Tawni and I were in the hall, I let her have it. “Captain Larson?! Tawni, what is going on here? You can’t just beam strangers onto my ship! Do you even know this guy?”

“Well, no…” she stammered, “not really.”

“No, you don’t know him? You have no idea who he is? He could be a thief or a murderer! He could be beaming an army onboard as we speak!” I was furious. I was probably yelling too, only I couldn’t tell over the noise coming out of my mouth.

She had the nerve to be indignant. “Then why don’t you go in there and talk to him? That’s what I brought him here for.”

“That’s – that’s what you – !” I clenched and unclenched my fists a couple times and took a deep breath. “You know very well I could have opened a channel with him. Why didn’t you just come get me?”

“Look, I know what I did was wrong, Larson, and I’m sorry. But you don’t have to treat me like a child.” She was too calm.

“What are you, barely 19?” At that, she glared at me and then simply walked away. I figured I had pegged her age.

Now I had to go talk to this Able Ryson. What did he want? I could tell by the look on his face hat he had heard the whole thing.

“Captain Larson,” I was really starting to hate that title, “I mean you no harm. Your lieutenant let me on board and said I could talk to you,” Ryson explained.

I mentally rolled my eyes. “Mr. Ryson, you’ve been brought here under false pretenses. For one thing, Tawni is not my lieutenant, and I have never given her permission to let anyone aboard my ship.” I felt bad telling him all that so bluntly, so I added, “Of course, you had no way of knowing all that. So you might as well just tell me what it is you wanted to tell me.”

Able explained to me that he and his wife and three kids were taking a trip across this section of the galaxy when their hyper-drive malfunctioned. He said they were running low on their food supplies and would not manage to the nearest planet in time.

“Unfortunately,” I explained, “my HD is also offline.” Able looked downcast. What else could I do? “How much do you have?” I asked.

“If rationed properly, about a week’s worth.”

“And it’s still about two weeks off,” I said. He nodded. I knew how I could help them. Maybe even Tawni did. But I wouldn’t just give free stuff to anyone with a sob story. “Come back later for dinner, so we can talk more,” I said impulsively. “Bring your wife and kids, too.”

“Captain –”

“And please don’t call me Captain.”

Able smiled. “Thank you. I’ll go back and tell them.”

I nodded then beamed him back out. I knew I should make peace with Tawni. Perhaps I had invited the Rysons as much for her as for them. I knew she’d be pleased. And I knew she was still mad at me. What I didn’t know was why I cared so much.

Read Part 2 here
Read Part 4 here